The Nightly Hope
by baekheui
Summary: don't know if AU: Dally is still alive, and Cherry finds herself thinking about him every now and then.


**I had an unusual feeling while I was obsessing over _The Outsiders_. It was gone after I wrote this story.**

**Disclaimer: S.E. Hinton owns The Outsiders and all its content. **

/

She looked at me quickly. "I could fall in love with Dallas Winston," she said. "I hope I never see him again, or I will."

* * *

There was something about Dallas Winston that made her flush. The way her own bright, green eyes meets his blazing blue ones; the way he towered over her nimble figure; the way she could smell the remnants of the alcoholic drink he had last night–a Martini, perhaps. It was all so mesmerizing to her.

She couldn't even bring herself to admit, a Greaser had made Cherry Valance's stomach tingle at the thought of the latter. Bob's cuddles and kisses were sweet, gentle, but Dally's threatening glare already had an effect on her.

It wasn't trying to act in front of Ponyboy that she was different than the usual Greaser's image of the Socs– she really dug sunsets, and she wondered if Dally ever saw one. Heck, she wondered if Dally really thought of her as a cute redhead, as he had mentioned that day at the drive-in.

Perhaps she could try to get Ponyboy to find out, but she knew things were already going hard on him.

Unfortunately for her the only people whom she knew in the Greasers gang were the ones that were the most affected by Johnny's death: Ponyboy and Dally, so she had a risk of getting told off. Nonetheless, she still wanted to spend some quality time with Dallas Winston, maybe to try to distract him if she could. She found herself heading to the DX Ponyboy's brother, Sodapop worked at. Luck blessed her when she found him at the front of the gasoline station, with the usual crowd of girls surrounding him, attempting to hit on him. She approached the pack nonchalantly, waiting for a disperse. She wanted to talk to Soda alone without all these girls eavesdropping on their conversation; it was still awkward for her to communicate with greasers, so she felt twenty times more restless with all these greaser girls around. Sodapop noticed her, however, and waved a hand at her. "Hey, Cherry!"

She thanked the heavens the fangirls didn't look back, only a few turning to shoot her faces of disgust. She winced. She didn't like being the centre of attention sometimes. It bugged her. "Sodapop, hey." She got closer to the crowd, in order for him to hear her better. "Any idea on where Dallas is?"

"You're lucky," Soda grinned. "Dally's in there. You'll find him easy,"

She nodded him thanks with a grateful smile, and went round the crowd into the gasoline station. One could hear the loud conversation between two hoods; one voice which she recognized as Dally's, the other she didn't know who.

She figured on how to approach them. She then cursed herself for not bringing her Sting Ray– she could have pretended her car had faults to avoid misunderstandings.

"Hey," she called out. "Anyone in there?"

The voices stopped at once, and Cherry felt stupid. Obviously there was someone there, which ghost would be having a conversation by themselves in a gasoline station?

She then saw a flash of blonde from the behind of the rusty metal shelves, and then Dally emerged. "Well, well, well," he taunted, moving closer to her. "Isn't this the redhead that told me to go to hell the night at The Nightly Double?"

She almost regret coming to the DX, but she reminded herself of the reason she went there in the first place. She took a deep breath. "Your presence here tells me that you have not experienced it there yet, though." she scoffed in return. "I just wanted to hang out with you for a while, is that okay?"

The blond did a catcall. "Steve, mate!" he turned to look at his friend, who was also initially behind the shelves with him. "A Soc wants to take me out on a date!"

The other greaser with his slick hair groomed in swirls appeared from the shelves, and he, too, did a catcall. "Wow, dude," the greaser nodded in approval, grinning. "You picked up a real fine one that night, mate."

Dallas put an arm around his companion and clicked his tongue, grinning along. "And she's a Soc. Jackpot of the day, baby."

The duo started cheering together, and Cherry was starting to get pissed, jaws clenched. She rolled her eyes. "Look, if you two continue to act like this, I'm just going to have to leave, okay?"

She started to turn back, but Dallas was faster. He catched up with her and put an arm around her this time. He then whispered in her ear.

"No one escapes from Dallas Winston."


End file.
